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22 Feb 2010 : Column 267W—continued
| Completions | |||
| 2006-07 | 2007-08 | 2008-09 | |
Sarah Teather: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (1) how much funding his Department has allocated to the Homebuy scheme in financial year 2009-10 to date; how much such funding it expects to allocate in financial years (a) 2010-11, (b) 2011-12, (c) 2012-13, (d) 2013-14 and (e) 2014-15; and how much such funding it expects to allocate beyond financial year 2014-15; [317007]
(2) how much funding his Department has allocated to low cost income ownership programmes in financial year 2009-10 to date; how much such funding it expects to allocate in financial years (a) 2010-11, (b) 2011-12, (c) 2012-13, (d) 2013-14 and (e) 2014-15; and how much such funding it expects to allocate beyond financial year 2014-15. [317008]
John Healey: From 1 April 2009 to 30 December 2009 the Homes and Communities Agency has allocated £1,082 million for Homebuy and other low cost home ownership products within their Affordable Housing Programme.
Allocations for the Affordable Housing Programme 2008-11 are made as part of the Homes and Communities continuous market engagement process. Future estimated levels of allocations beyond 2010-11 will be dependent upon the outcome of the next spending review.
Buildings: Energy
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how many properties on the (a) domestic and (b) non-domestic Energy Performance Certificate Register have received more than one inspection in the last three years; and for how many the rating (i) declined and (ii) improved in the last inspection. [316815]
John Healey: There is no information held centrally about the number of energy assessments that are carried out on individual buildings in either the domestic or non-domestic sectors.
Community Development: Business
Julia Goldsworthy: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how much has been spent on (a) assistance to businesses, (b) staffing, (c) administration and (d) publicity under the Local Enterprise Growth Initiative since its inception; and how many businesses have been assisted by the initiative. [317702]
Ms Rosie Winterton: LEGI is allocated to local authorities to support enterprise in deprived areas, thereby giving them the flexibility to best determine the local needs and use the funding in creative ways to support local priorities. The total programme from 2006-07 to 2010-11 is worth £418 million.
As a locally managed fund, central Government do not hold the information requested.
However, an independent national evaluation of LEGI is scheduled to be published later this year which will help to identify and disseminate good practice.
Eco-Towns
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (1) what factors his Department plans to take into account in awarding the (a) minimum and (b) maximum allocations to each of the eco-town projects, as referred to in the notes for editors of his Department's press notice of 8 February 2010; [316946]
(2) what proportion of the funding announced in his Department's press notice of 8 February 2010 on eco-towns will come from each programme budget of (a) his Department and (b) the Homes and Communities Agency; and what proportion of the funding will come from the Department for Children, Schools and Families. [316951]
John Healey: Details about the programme budgets to support the first wave eco-towns in 200-10 will be set out in the Spring Supplementaries, which are due to be published shortly.
The majority of the £60 million growth fund that I announced last July to support the first wave locations has been allocated to local authorities and will be paid via the HCA. In addition we have provided support for the HCA's delivery role. DCSF have allocated £2.5 million from their programme budget to support greener schools.
I will decide on the funding allocations to the local authorities for 2010-11, pending further assessment of development agreements with investors. We will also need to take account of a range of factors including progress on delivery of projects, and we and the HCA will be having further discussion with authorities on these matters.
Empty Property: Lancashire
Rosie Cooper: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what estimate he has made of the number of properties in West Lancashire constituency which have been empty for more than (a) two and (b) five years. [317777]
Barbara Follett: This information for either domestic or non-domestic properties is not held centrally.
Our reforms to empty property relief for non-domestic are principled and right for the long-term. They provide a strong incentive on owners to bring empty property back into use, helping to improve access to premises for businesses and so to exert a downward pressure on commercial rents.
However, we provided owners with real help to manage short-term pressures in a difficult property market by exempting all empty properties with rateable values up to £15,000 from business rates in 2009-10.
We have listened to the continued concerns of owners and we are extending the temporary measure for a further 12 months-to cover the whole of 2010-11-and we are uprating the threshold to £18,000 in line with the general movement of property values at revaluation.
Fire Services: Pensions
Robert Neill: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government pursuant to the answer to the hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield of 26 January 2010, Official Report, column 770W, on local government and fire services: pensions, what the timetable is for the review of whether to restrict the employer contributions made to the firefighters' pension scheme. [317877]
Ms Rosie Winterton: The Firefighters Pension Committee has begun to consider the application of cap and share arrangements for the firefighters' pension schemes. Further meetings of the Committee have been arranged and the next one takes place on 15 March 2010. Consultations with stakeholders will follow once the arrangements have been drafted.
Government Offices for the Regions: Finance
Julia Goldsworthy: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government which programme budgets are administered for each Government Department by the Government Offices for the Regions. [317369]
Ms Rosie Winterton: I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to her by the Secretary of State on 10 February 2010, Official Report, column 1029W.
Home Information Packs
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government pursuant to the answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr. Jackson) of 3 February 2010, Official Report, columns 359-60W, on home information packs, if he will place in the Library a copy of the final report by the Working Group on Condition Information in the Home Buying and Selling Process; on what date the report was submitted to his Department; and what steps he plans to take in response to that report. [316781]
Mr. Ian Austin: The final report of the Working Group on Condition Information was submitted to the Department in late December. We are looking carefully at the recommendations and will set out our response in due course.
Homelessness: Torbay
Mr. Sanders: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how many (a) rough sleepers and (b) homeless people there were in Torbay constituency in (i) 1997 and (ii) the latest period for which figures are available. [314612]
Mr. Ian Austin: Data on rough sleeping and local housing authorities' activities under homelessness legislation are collected at local authority rather than constituency level. Torbay constituency falls within Torbay unitary authority.
Information on rough sleeping has been collected since 1998. In Torbay in 1998 there were 31 rough sleepers. The last street count in 2007 found nine rough sleepers.
We have reduced rough sleeping by 75 per cent. since 1998. Our national baseline was 1,850 in 1998 and the latest headline figure based on local authority rough sleeper counts was 464 for 2009.
The numbers of households accepted as statutory homeless in Torbay unitary authority in 1997-98 and 2007-08 are 253 and 119 respectively. The number of households accommodated by the Torbay unitary authority in temporary accommodation as at 30 March 1997 is 25 and as at 30 September 2009 is 163.
In 2002, we put stronger legislation in place by ensuring that more vulnerable people who face homelessness are provided with help and accommodation by extending the categories of people who have a 'priority need for accommodation" under the homelessness legislation-hence why more people were placed in temporary accommodation.
We know we need to do more to help people into settled homes. That's why our strategy includes the challenging target of halving the number of people living in temporary accommodation to 50,500 by 2010.
We have allocated a total of £220 million to local authorities and voluntary organisations over the three years 2008-09 to 2010-11 to support their strategies for tackling and preventing homelessness in their area.
The Government continue to demonstrate a long-term commitment to affordable housing, which is why between June and November we approved more than £2.4 billion towards 41,000 new affordable homes in England. Of this funding over £3 million has been allocated to schemes for Torbay.
This includes the largest council house-building programme for nearly two decades and funding for housing associations to build more homes for affordable sale or rent, and thousands of first time buyers have also managed to get a foothold on the property ladder thanks to our homebuy schemes.
Homes and Communities Agency
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how much (a) the Homes and Communities Agency, (b) the Homes and Communities Agency Academy and (c) the Tenant Services Authority spent on (i) advertising and (ii) marketing in (A) 2008-09 and (B) 2009-10 to date; and how much has been budgeted for such expenditure in 2009-10. [316431]
John Healey: The following table provides information on advertising and marketing spend by the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA), the Homes and Communities Agency Academy and the Tenant Services Authority (TSA) in 2008-09. Full details of spend for 2009-10 will be available once the Annual Report and Accounts are published later this year.
| 2008-09 spend | |||
| £000 | |||
| HCA | HCA academy | TSA | |
| Notes: 1. All figures are subject to rounding. 2. The 2008-09 spend relates to the costs incurred since HCA and TSA's inception on 1 December 2008 and include the one offset up costs of both bodies. | |||
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how much was spent by the (a) Finance and Corporate Services, (b) Strategy, Performance and Research, (c) Investment and Regeneration, (d) Land and Development, (e) New Ventures and Partnerships and (f) Skills and Knowledge division of the Homes and Communities Agency in 2008-09; how much has been budgeted for each division in 2009-10; and what proportion of each figure is attributable to staff costs. [316432]
John Healey: The Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) was launched on 1 December 2008 but some time passed before its directorates were fully established, and for this reason it is not possible to provide a break-down of costs by division for 2008-09.
For 2009-10, the planned budgets for 2009-10 for these directorates, including how much is attributable to staff costs, is set out as follows:
| 2009-10 Budgets | |||||
| £000 | |||||
| Finance and Corporate Services | Strategy | Investment and Renewal | New Ventures and Partnerships | Academy (Skills and Knowledge) | |
| (1 )Includes travel and subsistence, regional training and where applicable, programme fees. Excludes agency-wide costs which cannot be disaggregated, such as accommodation costs and office facilities, IT, legal and records, national training. | |||||
Homes and Communities Agency: Loans
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government pursuant to the answer of 3 February 2010, Official Report, column 361W, on Homes and Communities Agency and Tenant Services Authority loans, what rate of interest was applied to loans to staff; and for what reason the loans were made. [316737]
John Healey: The Homes and Communities Agency and Tenant Services Authority staff loans break down as follows:
| Number | £ | |
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